Bunting, bunting and more bunting!

Whenever I get some time off, I love raiding my fabric stash and creating more fluttery country-chic bunting. I managed to create seven strings of bunting from what I had in my stash (and yet you still never have enough fabric...!) then laid it all out on the floor, took photographs and made notes to make sure I didn't forget the combinations, sizes and dimensions.

I decided to start with the longest piece of bias binding that I had and ironically for this time of year my brightest and most spring-like combination! Hopefully it will brighten up any dark days of winter ahead and remind us of the sunny and scorching days that we have had this year.

If every picture tells a story, I have a lot of stories!

Today I have been working on framing up all of the embroidered pieces I have been working on over the last year. I got in touch with Knuston Hall earlier this week and we now have a date for the craft fair in December! It gives me just over three months to get everything finished and finalised to make sure everything is ready to go.

I started with my smallest pieces, and framed my #girlboss and #goddess pieces in their small gold frames. I decided to hide the back using some decorative wrapping paper and then added the label to give a more professional finish.

When I was framing my slightly larger piece of embroidery, I didn't need the mount that it came with, however it came in very handy for neatening up the back and once fixed into place under the metal prongs I was able to add my label and the piece was finished.

Keeping with the idea of using the redundant mount to tidy up the back, I used the same process with my white frames. I stretched the calico over the wooden back-board, making sure that it was taught in all directions and evenly spaced so that the embroidery was central. I used double-sided sticky tape to keep the fabric in place, and then a multi-purpose PVA to stick down the corners and anchor any stray fabric. 

A couple of my embroidery designs have been circular, and it seemed a little silly to frame them in a square. I have seen this technique everywhere this year, so I decided to try framing a couple of pieces in a wooden embroidery frame. I placed the design in the hoop, made sure it was central and then pulled it taught, making sure that it was done up tight so it didn't slip.

I then turned the piece over and trimmed the excess fabric using pinking shears, leaving about 1.5cm all the way around. I then folded this over the frame and glued it in place using a multi-purpose PVA glue.

I attached a ribbon and voila!

A lovely piece of embroidery framed and ready to hang wherever you want. I love the slightly more casual feel of this frame, and the way you can hang it around your home more informally than if you had a rigid wooden frame.

All in all today I framed about 14 pieces of artwork, including all of my embroidered pieces and a few other pictures I have collected over the year. My cute badger lino print will sit on a shelf in our bedroom, the poster from the 'Femmes en Dior' exhibition in Granville, France was a present from my parents and will hang in the hall and our travel rail poster and Tower Bridge scene are going in our living room, it's great to get them all out on display and shown off to their full potential!

Stitching, embroidery and framing

I'm getting on well with the stitching designs for my new logo! I finished the wreath first, and then added the text afterwards. This is so I have two versions to play with my my logo, with or without the lettering. I'm also creating a long stitch name just on its own so I could use this separately as well. I know I could just digitally cut out the the text from the middle of my frame but I like the idea of having a separate piece of text as well.

Now it's all completed I have left it in the frame, trimmed away the excess fabric and attached a piece of my favourite striped ribbon to the top to hang it up. Here it will hang in my little picture gallery until I'm ready to work with it again!

I've been enjoying experimenting with new stitches recently, and I used french knots to fill in the centre of my dandelion. I love the texture against the straight and star stitch.

It's typical, when you're trying to form a knot with your thread they just keep slipping out, but if you're trying to avoid them they crop up all over the back of your fabric! 

I've now got quite a few pieces that are ready to be framed and I've also bought myself a few more wooden embroidery hoops to experiment with framing in a different way. I plan to do a couple of Christmassy pieces ready for some craft fairs, but then my next project will be to start embroidering everything for the wedding table centrepieces, very exciting! 

A Week of Baking...Lemon 'Bubbles' 40th Birthday Cake

My most recent cake commission that I worked on last week was a 40th Birthday cake. One of the major parts of the brief was that it had to be transported to Cornwall for the birthday celebrations, so this was the major factor to consider in my designs. There is nothing worse than worrying about a cake all the way to your destination (as I always do when I am delivering) so intricate designs and gravity-defying design elements were a definite no-no!

The client decided on a simple 'Bubble' design with added pearls and daisies to make the design a little more feminine, and chose a vanilla sponge and buttercream with a zingy lemon curd filling. To add to the design we added some candy-cane striped numbers and some polka dot letters to finish off the cake.

Making the decorations

To make the candy stripe letters I rolled out two long sausages of fondant...

...and then twisted them together to give the striped effect. I find that it helps if your fondant is a little sticky at this stage as it is easier to bond the two colours together. If they are too dry they may start to peel away from each other when you start to form your letters.

It's entirely up to you what style of letter or number you make, but I like to add twirly ends to mine. I always check the size of the figures on the base of the cake tin to make sure that they are the correct size when the rest of the elements are applied.

I then cut out a range of yellow and white daisies and added their pearly centres.

Cake assembly

After baking I split the cake, filled it with lemon curd and vanilla buttercream, crumb coated it and then chilled it... 

...before covering it with white sugar paste and adding the yellow ribbon.

I placed the wording and candy stripe numbers to check the placement, before sticking them down with edible glue and royal icing.

To tie the letters in with the polka dot theme, I then added tiny gold dots using edible gold paint.

Once the central elements had been applied, I then started adding my sugarpaste 'Bubbles' in a mixture of yellow and gold. I sprayed the white bubbles with a mixture of gold lustre and edible glitter before sticking them to the cake with edible glue.

The only thing better than normal glitter...is edible glitter!

When I had added all of the bubbles I used two different sizes of edible pearls to highlight the letters and decorate against the ribbon. I then added the daisies last in key places around the cake.

The finished cake was beautifully sparkly under the lights in the kitchen, and had a lovely sheen when I photographed it in the morning. The client really liked it when I delivered it, so I really hope the cake made it to the birthday celebrations with all decorations still in tact!

A Weekend of Baking...Beachcomber cupcakes

I haven't done any baking and experimenting in the kitchen for what seems like aaaages! So when I found myself with some time this weekend I decided to get to grips with my new seashell mould and cupcake corer. I used to just hollow mine out with a knife, pah! What an amateur! I also wanted to try out just what else I could do with salted caramel sauce (everything apparently!) so I designed my 'Beachcomber' cupcakes. Golden vanilla sponge with a salted caramel sauce core, vanilla buttercream, shortbread 'sand' and handpainted fondant seashells.

Making the fondant seashells

I went for a mixture of a pinky-beige for the seashells and pure white to see what would look best when painted.

Dusting the mould with cornflour using my new duster, an excellent invention!

Pressing the fondant into the mould. I found it easier not to overfill each section as they came out with fuzzy edges when I tried to trim them with a knife.

I waited for the icing to harden slightly in the mould, then turned the seashells out. Some of them were released slightly easier than others and some were a little less than perfect, but when have you ever found an absolutely pristine shell on a beach...?

Painting the seashells

Once the shells were dry I used a mixture of pink, lilac, green and brown to paint them. I found that the neater I tried to be the worse they looked, so I just ended up splodging the paint on and then blending the colours together with water which gave a lovely effect.

Coring the cupcakes

Once I had baked my cupcakes...(look how even they are!)

...I used my cupcake corer to twist into each cake...

...pulled out the centre...

...filled the core with a teaspoon of salted caramel sauce...

...and then put a little lid back on.

Decorating the cupcakes

I used a basic shortbread recipe and baked it in a sheet to make sure it was nice and crunchy. Then when cool I crumbled half of it into a bowl to make my sand!

I frosted each cupcake with a swirl of vanilla buttercream icing. I was debating mixing some of the salted caramel into the buttercream, but I wanted the salt to be a little bit of a surprise amongst all the sweet, so I decided to leave them as just plain vanilla.

I then used two shells to top each cupcake, making sure that each pair was different.

Then to finish them off I sprinkled on my shortbread sand and voila! My 'Beachcomber' cupcakes were complete. 

I suppose I could have added the sand first and pressed the shells in afterwards so they stood out a bit more, but I like the way it mimics how you actually find shells on a sandy beach. 

I was so pleased with my cupcake experiment and I shall look forward to making these again. I've got lots more experiments planned with my cupcakes, so watch this space!